10 Things that Carter Can Wow You With

It seems like Carter has made many changes this past week. Here are my top 10 favorites.
1. Biiiiigggg hugs! If you ask, "Where is my hug?" or if he just wants a hug, he stands with a clever grin, with his arms out wide.
2. New words: For a while now, he's had "ball", "dog", "bubbles", and they are each getting clearer. He is very proud of his "hi!" and his "bye!", complete with hand motions. He is working on his "hello", which seems to be just for when he is on the phone.
3. Talking on the phone: he wants to turn everything into a phone, the wiimote, the toy phone, the remote control. Usually, he'll try to say "hello", and wants to hit as many buttons as he can. Occasionally, he even babbles a bit.
4. Animal sounds: Evidently, if a bear, tiger, dinosaur or car crept up behind you and made a noise, you'd be confused as they all make the exact same noise: "roar" -- at least according to Carter. Obviously, they are different, as the tiger has claws out in front.
5. Kitty Cat: I think the first animal sounds Carter tried were the dog (which he still doesn't really have down yet) and the cat. With the other animals, you can show him a picture and he'll make the sound. But with a cat, you can just ask him, and he'll give a high-pitched, "Meow". We need to document this on video, just to capture how completely adorable it is. We're working on duck, snake, and (since Alex did it so wonderfully... ) lizard.
6. Book patience: Over the past month, Carter has been interested in books, particularly in pulling them off the shelves. Now, he is content with a *pile* of books, and actually sits in your lap while you go through them. He wants variety, and lets you know when it is time to move on by pointing, saying "book" and doing the sign language for book. I hear that at daycare, he spends a lot of time in the book area. He likes turning pages, and especially likes pictures of animals (particularly the ones that roar). He even puts his books *back* on the shelf if you ask... sometimes.
7. Eating: his finger food skills are getting better, but he wants to use silverware! Tonight, he did a fair job of spearing banana slices with a fork. This is quite an improvement considering the first time I gave him a fork he literally poked himself in the eye with it. He also likes to blow on his food when it is hot.
8. Crazy dizzy spinning: A milestone has been reached, Carter now knows the joy of walking in a circle or spinning until he is dizzy. I think this was accelerated by his ear infection (it probably doesn't take much to make him dizzy), but he gets a kick out of it.
9. Facial features: He can point and name his (and your) eyes, ears, nose, mouth. He'll get his teeth named every once in a while. If you heard the words out of context, you might not understand them. But, he usually clarifies the label by sticking his finger *in* your eye, nose, mouth or ear.
10. Anything Alex does: He continues his adoration of his older brother. Fortunately, Alex takes it all in good humor and tries very much to 'help' his brother. Carter will just watch Alex, and mimic any gesture, action, sound. Alex helped Carter climb up on the couch the other day and Carter just sat there with the biggest, proudest grin on his face, watching Alex as if to say, "OK, now what?"